There remain many uncertainties about Wallace's
various positions, but one thing we absolutely can be sure of is that
he was, for the majority of his adult life, a practicing spiritualist.
Theistically-inclined scientists have been by no means rare, of course;
on the other hand, relatively few scientists have attempted to advance
models of nature that directly integrate materialistic and spiritual elements.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin immediately comes to mind as another name in
this arena, but in his case the theistic teleology invoked is easily seen
as both prior and explicit, and the materialism a derivative, if complementary,
device. In Wallace's work, by contrast, a logic-based naturalism is the
elemental component, but it is a naturalism so comprehensive as to directly
incorporate moral, ethical--and some would say, theistic--concerns. The
American philosopher Charles Peirce once referred to him in the following
wonderfully descriptive terms:

Not quite a typical man of science
is Wallace; not a man who observes and studies only because he is eager
to learn, because he is conscious that his actual conceptions and theories
are inadequate, and he feels a need of being set right; nor yet one
of those men who are so dominated by a sense of the tremendous importance
of a truth in their possession that they are borne on to propagate it
by all means that God and nature have put into their hands--no matter
what, so long as it be effective. He is rather a man conscious of superior
powers of sound and solid reasoning, which enable him to find paths
to great truths that other men could not, and also to put the truth
before his fellows with a demonstrative evidence that another man could
not bring out; and along with this there is a moral sense, childlike
in its candor, manly in its vigor, which will not allow him to approve
anything illogical or wrong, though it be upon his own side of a question
which stirs the depths of his moral nature.1

Among
Wallace's contemporaries only Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) could match
him in shear breadth of interest and creative energy. Unlike Spencer (who
Wallace once referred to as a "thinking machine"), however, Wallace's
attention was always focused on the world of actual events. He was one
of the most perceptive observers of his (or any) time, and this skill
was comprised equally of sympathetic, reasoning, and classificatory abilities.
His synthetic abilities were not so much strong as they were implicit,
flowing naturally from a powerful talent at reasoning things to their
elemental level, and abetted by an insatiable curiosity. Writer Frank
Harris, who knew him for many years, described him as follows:

He was interested in every phase
of thought; the connection between mathematics and metaphysics, the
provoking laws that govern chances and regulate coincidences, the mysterious
movements of the human spirit by contradictories, by analogies, by merely
verbal dissonance and assonance, the gropings of consciousness in the
child, the senile decay of mind and memory, the higher law of sex unions--he
had studied all of them and said something worthful about most of them.
And under the panoply of knowledge his mind moved freely; he questioned
this axiom and rejected that much-vaunted conclusion without a shadow
of hesitation. Bit by bit he impressed me as some natural force impresses
despite its simplicity.2

Wallace's
lack of formal education (he left school at age thirteen) and relatively
low social status were never any impediment to his personal progress as
a thinker. Lacking neither self-confidence nor courage in his convictions,
he was ever ready to take up a cause he thought was worth defending. Though
generally modest and self-effacing, he was willing to give at least one
frank appraisal of his abilities in his autobiography My Life
in 1905:

...This rather long digression
may be considered to be out of place, but it is given in order to illustrate
the steps by which I gradually acquired confidence in my own judgment,
so that in dealing with any body of facts bearing upon a question in
dispute, if I clearly understood the nature of the facts and gave the
necessary attention to them, I would always draw my own inferences from
them, even though I had men of far greater and more varied knowledge
against me. Thus I have never hesitated to differ from Lyell, Darwin,
and even Spencer, and, so far as I can judge, in all the cases in which
I have so differed, the weight of scientific opinion is gradually turning
in my direction. In reasoning power upon the general phenomena of nature
or of society, I feel able to hold my own with them; my inferiority
consists in my limited knowledge, and perhaps also in my smaller power
of concentration for long periods of time.

With Huxley also I felt quite
on an equality when dealing with problems arising out of facts equally
well known to both of us; but wherever the structure or functions of
animals were concerned, he had the command of a body of facts so extensive
and so complex that no one who had not devoted years to their practical
study could safely attempt to make use of them. I therefore never ventured
to infringe in any way on his special departments of study, though I
occasionally made use of some of the results which he so lucidly explained...3

Wallace's
mental explorations led him to just as many interesting places as his
physical ones did. Certainly his association with spiritualism stands
at or near the top of the list in this regard. But previous attempts to
understand Wallace's attraction to spiritualism, and in turn its relation
to his thinking on other subjects, have largely ignored the very subject
that would make a sound appreciation possible. That subject is belief.
Wallace had, as it turns out, a well-developed position on the matter
of the relation of belief to observation, and it was a position that he
apparently held literally his entire adult life. It is the purpose of
this chapter to illuminate that position, and to show how it contributed
to several other key elements of his thinking.

The most cogent
general analyses of Wallace's beliefs, particularly in reference to spiritualism,
and how these affected his later thinking on evolution and other subjects,
are by R. Smith (1972), Kottler (1974), Schwartz (1984), Oppenheim (1985),
and Malinchak (1987). Before we proceed further, a quick review of these
sources is in order.

Roger Smith's essay
represented an important step forward in the understanding of Wallace's
work in general with its recognition of the interdependent nature of his
ideas: "...Whereas it has been customary to consider his thought as primarily
biological and his digressions into phrenology, spiritualism, socialism,
and ethnology as peripheral, these apparently diverse subjects were in
reality aspects of a unified interpretation of the world in terms of humanitarian
values."4 Smith decides that "A consideration
of Wallace's philosophy of nature...leads to the conclusion that he saw
and intended no discontinuity between general and human evolution and
that it is a mistaken view to recognize such a discontinuity."5
Smith takes relatively little notice of Wallace's adoption of spiritualism
in his analysis, however, preferring to attribute his rejection of the
all-sufficiency of natural selection in particular to a posed incompatibility
of its logic with his utopian social views, especially to the extent that
the principle of utility could not be used to account for the higher human
faculties.

Smith's analysis is one of the most succinct descriptions
of Wallace's overall intellectual world view to date. Nevertheless, the
work does not address the sizable issue of how any of the strands of this
world view might have come together. For example, with respect to the effects
on his thinking of spiritualism in particular, he merely states "...it is
not clear when or why he became involved with spiritualism."6 Again: "...it remains an historical problem to determine how far
the teleology of the later work was present in his thought during the earlier
period."7

Kottler spends a
goodly portion of his lengthy study on the special problem of the chronology
of Wallace's involvement with spiritualism and its effects on his thoughts
on evolution and the origin of man. He comes to the more directed conclusion
that Wallace's belief in psychical phenomena "deeply influenced his evolutionary
thought;"8 i.e., that "...spiritualism stimulated
Wallace to reconsider the utility of various human features"9
and in turn became the efficient cause of his divergence of viewpoint
from Darwin on the issue of man's origins. Kottler also entertains--but
ultimately rejects as unlikely--two additional scenarios that might explain
Wallace's divergence from Darwin's views on man: (1) that he had "two
independent grounds for his divergence--scientific and spiritual;" i.e.,
that he had "originally concluded that natural selection was
inadequate in the origin of man on the basis of his utilitarian analysis
of various human features"10 and (2) that
"the source of Wallace's recognition of natural selection's inadequacy
in the origin of man was his own conception of the nature of natural selection
rather than his belief in spiritualism."11

Schwartz's essay is primarily concerned with
showing how Wallace's views on man might have pushed Darwin into writing
The Descent of Man, but he also gives attention to the spiritualism
issue, deciding that Wallace's position on man must have begun to shift
before he committed himself to spiritualism in 1865. He opines "Wallace's
departure from the Darwinian point of view of the origin of man resulted
from his inability to bridge his scientific and moral beliefs;"12
that "Wallace's belief in social equality and political reform conflicted
with the ineluctable operations of natural law (including natural selection)."13

Oppenheim provides
an excellent overall review of Wallace's spiritualist leanings and activities,
dwelling on what she views as his inability to reject "the dividing line
between science and spiritualism" and desire to "eliminate the aura of
the supernatural that clung to spiritualist phenomena."14
Still, she is unable to decide "whether spiritualism alone can explain
Wallace's rejection of natural selection as the sole agent of evolutionary
change where the human race was concerned. Because he did not specifically
combine his spiritualist convictions with biological arguments until 1889,
he seemed to base his revised evolutionary views on considerations of
utility... It does appear that Wallace's doubts about natural selection
first arose from evidence acquired at the séance table, not from
biological or geological discoveries that forced him to reconsider his
initial theory of evolution in respect of humanity."15

Malinchak examines
the story of Wallace's intellectual development from a largely sociological
perspective. Regarding the man/natural selection question, she advises
"It was only after Wallace engaged in his extensive studies in spiritualism
and became convinced of the genuineness of spiritualistic phenomena that
he began to inject quasi-religious notions of the guidance of higher intelligences
in the development of the human mind into his scientific arguments."16
Malinchak nevertheless does not specifically refer Wallace's conversion
to spiritualism to causes rooted in his natural selection views, apparently
preferring to interpret it as a residual effect of some of his early experiences
with the supernatural, and of period social and intellectual trends.

Some other writers
who have contributed to the discussion include Tracy (1985), Barrow (1986),
Wiggins (1988), DeCarvalho (1988-1989), Scarpelli (1993), and Pels (1995).

To summarize...
The position now generally held is that Wallace was led to spiritualistic
belief as a function of his final (perhaps disillusioned) inability to
view human evolution in entirely materialistic terms--in particular, as
the result of the limitations of natural selection. In this view, spiritualism
may have provided Wallace with a previously missing religious element
in his life--one which also explained (away) the intellectual and moral
development of the human race.

It seems to me,
however, that these conclusions represent a mis-reading of the sum of
facts now available. My assessment of the situation is that Wallace had
from the very beginning been pursuing a course of investigation that inherently
(and, to a large extent, unwittingly) denied priority to materialistic
interpretations of nature, and that only through natural selection and
spiritualism was he able to forge a synthesis compatible with a naturalistic
kind of logic. Consistent with this idea, I shall take the position that
all events in Wallace's intellectual evolution after 1858 are entirely
predictable given conclusions he had reached by that year. We will begin
by reviewing the facts of Wallace's conversion to spiritualism.

As is now well known
from both his own writings and secondary analysis,17
Wallace was first introduced to occult phenomena when he attended a lecture-demonstration
on mesmerism given by a Mr. Spencer Hall in 1844. Sometime earlier, he
had read George Combe and become interested in related phrenological subjects.18
At that early date, there were few believers in mesmerism. Indeed, the
common opinion, especially within the scientific and medical communities,
was that its supposed physical manifestations were the stuff of hoax and
trickery. Wallace attended the lecture as a nonbeliever; shortly afterward,
however, he found himself able to induce the same effects that he had
witnessed on stage on subjects of his own choosing, and eventually became
a skilled practitioner of the art.19 This
had a profound effect on him, as he learned, in his own recollection,
"my first great lesson in the inquiry into those obscure fields of knowledge,
never to accept the disbelief of great men, or their accusations of imposture
or of imbecility, as of any weight when opposed to the repeated observation
of facts by other men admittedly sane and honest."20

For Wallace, the implications of this "great
lesson" were profound. It forced its way into his thinking at two distinct,
but fully complementary, levels. In the more general sense, new discoveries--no
matter how unusual--were deserving of detached and rational study, not
ignorant, ill-informed disbelief. More specially and in particular, what
we would now term "paranormal" phenomena were not to be branded unworthy
of attention a priori. We may be quite sure that the overall
lesson was in fact both fully absorbed and later acted upon: Wallace argued
these points very frequently in his later works. One clear example is
afforded by statements incorporated into a short address he prepared for
his honorary appointment as President of the Department of Anthropology,
Section D, Biology, at the autumn 1866 meetings of the British Association
for the Advancement of Science. This address features the following cautionary
remarks:

Now it is our object as anthropologists
to accept the well-ascertained conclusions which have been arrived at
by the students of all these various sciences, to search after every
new fact which may throw additional light upon any of them, and, as
far as we are able, to combine and generalize the whole of the information
thus obtained. We cannot therefore, afford to neglect any facts relating
to man, however trivial, unmeaning, or distasteful some of them may
appear to us. Each custom, superstition, or belief of savage or of civilised
man may guide us towards an explanation of their origin in common tendencies
of the human mind. Each peculiarity of form, colour, or constitution
may give us a clue to the affinities of an obscure race. The anthropologist
must ever bear in mind that, as the object of his study is man,
nothing pertaining to or characteristic of man can be unworthy of his
attention. It will be only after we have brought together and arranged
all the facts and principles which have been established by the various
special studies to which I have alluded, that we shall be in a condition
to determine the particular lines of investigation most needed to complete
our knowledge of man, and may hope ultimately to arrive at some definite
conclusions on great problems which must interest us all--the questions
of the origin, the nature, and the destiny of the human race. I would
beg you to recollect also that here we must treat all these problems
as purely questions of science, to be decided solely by facts and by
legitimate deductions from facts. We can accept no conclusions as authoritative
that have not been thus established. Our sole object is to find out
for ourselves what is our true nature, to feel our way cautiously, step
by step, into the dark and mysterious past of human history, to study
man under every phase and aspect of his present conditions, and from
the knowledge thus gained to derive (as we cannot fail to do) some assistance
in our attempts to govern and improve uncivilized tribes, some guidance
in our own national and individual progress.21

Wallace
had surely spent a considerable portion of his travel years mulling over
the basic validity of his "great lesson," especially in its relevance
to the customs and beliefs of the many native peoples among whom he lived
and worked. Their religions, superstitions, and cosmological traditions
especially attracted his attention, and once he had returned to England
he made frequent use of his observations in subsequent writings. This
included "great lesson"-related commentary: Wallace's contempt for a
priori dismissal of native beliefs is implicit in the following passage
from his review of Edward Tylor's book Primitive Culture in 1872:

...Equally unsatisfactory is
the practice of leaving out of view, in theories of mental development,
the numerous well-established cases of abnormal mental phenomena which
indicate latent powers in man beyond those usually recognised. These
are looked upon as obscure diseases of the nervous system, and although
their occurrence is very rare to individual experience, the records
of them are now sufficiently voluminous to furnish comparable cases
to almost all that occur. They can thus be grouped into classes, and
this fact, of each one forming an item in a group of analogous cases,
is supposed to preclude the necessity of any attempt at a rational explanation
of them. This is the method very largely adopted by Mr. Tylor, who in
treating of the beliefs, customs, or superstitions of mankind, seems
often to be quite satisfied that he has done all that is required when
he has shown that a similar or identical belief or custom exists elsewhere...

...It is therefore at least a
possible solution of the problem of animism, that the uniformity of belief
is due in great part to the uniformity of the underlying facts;
and a work on the development of religion and mythology should fairly
grapple with the question, "How much of truth is at the bottom of the
so-called superstitious beliefs of mankind?" But our author avoids all
such inconvenient enquiries by means of his infallible nostrum. A fact
or a belief occurring once only might require explanation, but if a second
or an analogous fact or belief can be found elsewhere, the whole thing
becomes clear. "Second sight," for instance, occurs among savages as well
as in Scotland. Nothing more is required, according to Mr. Tylor, to prove
that it has no existence at all, except as a mere "belief." Those curious
phenomena which have been recently investigated by Mr. Crookes and other
Fellows of the Royal Society, and which are declared to be realities by
members of the French Institute, by American judges and senators, and
by many medical and scientific men in this country, are treated in exactly
the same way. Something closely related to them is recorded by classical
writers, and occurs now among savage tribes. It is therefore clearly a
case of "survival of old beliefs," and no further notice need be taken
of it. Mr. Tylor even goes so far as to say that for his purpose it really
matters little whether they are true or not. In order to arrive at true
results as to the origin, nature, and development of men's beliefs, it
matters not whether their foundation is fact or imagination! This belief
of Mr. Tylor seems to the present writer as completely an hallucination
as any to be found recorded in his volumes...

...These examples (and many others
might be adduced) should teach us, that it is unsafe to deny facts which
have been vouched for by men of reputation after careful enquiry, merely
because they are opposed to our prepossessions. A work like the present,
one-sided though it be, furnishes much evidence to support the views
of those who maintain that a considerable portion of the so-called superstitions
of mankind repose upon facts; that these facts have been almost always
misunderstood and misinterpreted in past ages, as they are now by the
ignorant and among savages; and that, until they are recognised as possible
realities, and studied with thoroughness and devotion and a complete
freedom from foregone conclusions, it is hopeless to expect a sound
philosophy of religion or any true insight into the mysterious depths
of our spiritual nature.22

A reply from Tylor
regarding what he viewed as a basic similarity between mesmerism and mediumistic
trances prompted further caustic remarks by Wallace the next week:

The two classes of phenomena,
therefore, differ fundamentally; and it is a most convincing proof of
Mr. Tylor's very slender acquaintance with either of them, that he should
even suggest their identity. The real connection between them is quite
in an opposite direction. It is the mediums, not the assistants, who
are "sensitives." They are almost always subject to the mesmeric influence,
and they often exhibit all the characteristic phenomena of coma, trance,
rigidity, and abnormal sense-power. Conversely, the most sensitive mesmeric
patients are almost invariably mediums. The idea that it is necessary
for me to inform "spiritualists" that I believe in the power of mesmerisers
to make their patient believe what they please, and that this "information"
might "bring about investigations leading to valuable results," is really
amusing, considering that such investigations took place twenty years
ago, and led to this important result--that almost all the most experienced
mesmerists (Prof. Gregory, Dr. Elliotson, Dr. Reichenbach, and many
others) became spiritualists!23

Nor was the "great
lesson" of his youth forgotten in Wallace's later years. In his essay
"The Birds of Paradise in the Arabian Nights" in 1904 he remarks:

in the whole range of the Arabian
Nights...all its natural or magical journeys by land or by sea, all
its descriptions of countries and islands, and all its references to
their natural products or the customs of their inhabitants, are in every
case founded upon some more or less fragmentary or misunderstood observations
of the facts of nature, distorted in proportion to the number of transmissions
they have passed through, overlaid by a mass of magic and mystery due
to the exuberance of the Eastern imagination, but always, when these
various sources of error are fairly allowed for, showing, to the careful
enquirer, the original substratum of truth.24

Thus, even from stories "overlaid by a mass of magic"
one could, with careful consideration, glean important truths.25

*
*
*

Given the turn of mind just described, it is
less surprising a priori that not long after his return to England
in 1862 Wallace began to look into the by-then well-established, but still-growing,
spiritualism movement. Just how long after his return this effort
began, however, has remained an unresolved question. The chronology of
his adoption of spiritualism--whether Wallace was predisposed against
uninformed disbelief or not--is important, because it bears directly on
the state of his thoughts on human evolution during this critical period
in his life, and especially on the rationale for certain wordings in his
influential 1864 essay on the origin of human races, "The Origin of Human
Races and the Antiquity of Man Deduced From the Theory of 'Natural Selection'."26
Malcolm Kottler refers the beginning of Wallace's interest to the year
1865, stating "...from 1862 to 1865 there is no evidence of any interest
by Wallace in spiritualism."27 But it should
be noted that Wallace himself specifically pointed to the year 1862 on
at least one occasion: as part of his testimony in 1907 in the fraud trial
of medium J. N. Maskelyne;28 he also rather
vaguely refers to 1862 in a late interview:

When I returned from abroad I
had read a good deal about Spiritualism, and, like most people, believed
it to be a fraud and a delusion. This was in 1862. At that time I met
a Mrs. Marshall, who was a celebrated medium in London, and after attending
a number of her meetings, and examining the whole question with an open
mind and with all the scientific application I could bring to bear upon
it, I came to the conclusion that Spiritualism was genuine. However,
I did not allow myself to be carried away, but I waited for three years
and undertook a most rigorous examination of the whole subject, and
was then convinced of the evidence and genuineness of Spiritualism.29

A second interview, from 1904, includes the unsupported
statement that "from the year 1863, from the very beginning of his scientific
career... [he] has been the avowed champion of spiritualism."30
In both My Life31 and the 1875 sketch
"Notes of Personal Evidence,"32 moreover, he
notes that he was aware of writings on spiritualist phenomena even while
traveling in the East; that is, before 1862.

But "Notes of Personal
Evidence" also contains the seemingly definitive statement "It was in
the summer of 1865 that I first witnessed any of the phenomena of what
is called Spiritualism, in the house of a friend."33
In the same work (p. 135) he mentions that the first of his several visits
with the spiritualist medium Mrs. Marshall took place in September 1865;
he also refers (p. 139) the initiation of his sittings with Miss Nichols,
another medium, to November 1866. The date 1865 can also be inferred from
testimony Wallace provided during the Henry Slade trial of late 1876:
"I have been investigating this subject for eleven years,"34
and from a letter of his printed in the London Times of 4 January
1873: "I began the investigation about eight years ago..."35

More interesting,
perhaps, is a passage reported in an interview printed in The Bookman
in January 1898:

When I returned from abroad in
1862 I read about spiritualism, and, like most people, thought it all
imposture, delusion, idiocy. I met people, apparently intelligent and
sane, who assured me they had experienced wonderful things. Mrs. Marshall
was as that time a celebrated medium in London, and after close examination
I became convinced that the phenomena associated with her were perfectly
genuine. But it took three years' further investigation to satisfy me
that they were produced by spirits.36

These
words introduce a new and important complication that needs to be addressed.
If one takes them as accurately representing the matter, Wallace may well
have begun attending seances (at least Mrs. Marshall's) in September 1865,
but then taken another two or three years to fully adopt the spiritualist
explanation for what he was witnessing. Otherwise put, it took him a while
to accept the evidence of his senses--after first deciding to allow the
evidence of his senses a sizable say in the matter. This turns out to
be, as we shall see, a most reasonable interpretation of the entire related
chronology of events, and it is somewhat surprising that no one has explored
it to any extent thus far. The alternative view--that Wallace more or
less suddenly began investigating seance phenomena at the same time
he became a believer--seems, even in the absence of any other kind
of information, unlikely a priori.

In any case, we
are left with a several year period (roughly, 1864 to 1869) during which
Wallace was apparently exploring spiritualism-related concerns for uncertain
reasons. It would appear that these reasons cannot be satisfactorily identified
on the basis of Wallace's words alone, but fortunately additional kinds
of evidence can be brought to bear. Malinchak (1987) has pointed out that
it is logical to expect that Wallace's investigations could only have
reached a consuming level after 1865, at which point his natural history
collections would have been demanding less of his time. The actual record
of his publication activities supports this theory; between May 1862 and
December 1864 he produced thirteen works of systematic revision, but in
1865 only three, and in 1866, one. Still, he was not so busy during this
period that he was unable to give attention to other subjects--between
May 1862 and December 1864 he published at least thirteen additional writings,
in 1865 four, and in 1866 six.

A further significant clue bearing on this matter
comes from a very obscure published source. Volume 1 No. 1 of The
Spiritual News of 1 December 1870 contains a short note describing
discussion that followed the presentation of Wallace's first public address
on spiritualism, "An Answer to the Arguments of Hume, Lecky, and Others,
against Miracles" (S174). The chairperson of the proceedings, a leading
spiritualist writer and publisher named Benjamin Coleman, is quoted in
this source as having stated on that occasion that "it was just five years
ago" that he (Coleman) began the series of meetings which Wallace's address
continued, and that at "the very first meeting held in that room in connection
with Spiritualism, Mr. Wallace was present as a strong disbeliever." That
meeting, at which the eminent lecturer Emma Hardinge spoke, took place
on 6 November 1865.37 This supports the position
that as of late 1865, Wallace was still, at the very least, uncommitted.

It is additionally revealing to note that over
the twelve month period July 1865 to June 1866 only one of Wallace's publications
(S114) was of any real length (and this, a systematics work on pigeons
published in October 1865, might very well have been written some number
of months earlier). Further, in a letter to Darwin dated 2 October 1865
he writes: "...I am ashamed of my laziness. I have done nothing lately
but write a paper on Pigeons for the Ibis..."38
During this period, therefore, he really did significantly curtail his
writing activities, and, one suspects, was probably engaged in various
"spiritualism investigation" efforts. The final confirmation of this surmise
may be found in the pattern of Wallace's attendance of scientific meetings
over the period 1862 through 1867. On returning to English soil in the
Spring of 1862, Wallace was apparently eager to get himself involved in
the various scientific discussions of the day. Within a month he was beginning
to attend scientific meetings of professional societies, and over the
next five years may have been present at as many as a hundred or more
of these, sitting quietly and listening, or contributing papers and discussion.
In all seven organizations were involved: the Zoological Society of London,
the Royal Geographical Society, the British Association for the Advancement
of Science, the Ethnological Society of London, the Anthropological Society
of London, the Entomological Society of London, and the Linnean Society
of London. I have chronologically charted out Wallace's attendance at
meetings over the 1862 through 1867 period, and made the following interesting
discovery: between the middle of June 1865 and the middle of June 1866
Wallace attended only one meeting held by any of these seven bodies (on
4 July 1865 he attended a meeting of the Ethnological Society and commented
on a paper on phrenology--see S113a). This, despite
the fact that in both the preceding and following one year periods he
attended and spoke at a minimum (that is, contributed a paper or discussion
to the meeting) of eleven. Clearly, around May 1865 he had made a conscious
decision to re-orient his priorities for the time being.39

To summarize, although it remains quite possible
that Wallace actually did begin giving at least some attention to spiritualism
very soon after his return from the East, it was apparently three years
or more before he really started taking the subject to heart. There can
be no question, however, that by early or mid-1866 he had crossed the
line in this respect. "The Scientific Aspect of the Supernatural," a lengthy
(nearly monographic) essay on the subject, was composed no later than
in the early to mid-summer of that year. The history of the execution
of this work is unknown; in the Preface to the first edition of On
Miracles and Modern Spiritualism (S717) Wallace merely comments that
it had been "written in 1866 for the pages of a Secularist periodical."40
It appears that, in contrast with the better known "A Defence of Modern
Spiritualism" (S243)--composed at the request of editor John Morley of
the Fortnightly Review after the leadership of the journal The
Spiritualist had appealed to him to invite Wallace to discuss the
subject41--the earlier study was prepared
at Wallace's own initiation. Some considerable effort was required to
determine that it first appeared in print between 11 August and 29 September--in
installments--in a weekly called The English Leader. Shortly
after this initial run was completed it was reprinted as a pamphlet for,
as Wallace put it, "private circulation."42

Kottler (1974) provides
a long and excellent description, taken largely from My Life,
of Wallace's attempts at this time to get his colleagues to investigate
spiritualism on their own. "The Scientific Aspect of the Supernatural"
figured centrally in these efforts. Through it Wallace hoped that he could
show that the subject was worthy of a scientific approach. The subtitle
of the work is given as: "indicating the desirableness of an experimental
enquiry by men of science into the alleged powers of clairvoyants and
mediums." Indeed, the entire work, fifty-seven pages in length, may be
read as an argument to this effect. Wallace starts by advancing that "the
apparent miracle may be due to some yet undiscovered law of nature," then
continues on to describe the various ways of looking at the phenomena
involved as being "natural." Anecdotal evidence is then presented in quantity
from prominent persons one might suppose to have been dependable sources.
The work wraps up with discussions of the theory and moral teachings of
spiritualism--ostensibly in an effort to show why it is worth taking the
time to get involved with the subject at all.

Considering the publication date of this work,
and the other evidence presented earlier, Wallace's final decision to
publicly promote spiritualism as a subject worthy of investigation may
thus be narrowed down to the window of time encompassing the first several
months of 1866. Still, it cannot be concluded from this chronology that
by that time he had actually fully embraced the belief. Recalling the
passage from the interview printed in The Bookman, given above,
and the fact that through 1866 and 1867 he continued to attend seances,
it is more likely that he waited another three years before finally accepting
the validity of the phenomena. Apart from Kottler (1974), who alludes
to this but does not develop the idea to any extent, investigators have
generally ignored the possibility that Wallace might have gone through
a two stage process in adopting spiritualism. It took him about a year
(early or mid 1865 to early or mid 1866) to come to the decision that
spiritualism was worthy of peer-involving close study; over the following
two to three years he continued to aggressively investigate the subject
(including looking into the physical evidence of spirits) until reaching
a point (late 1868 or early 1869) of actually wholeheartedly embracing
the belief himself.43 This common-sensical
understanding of his chronology of interest is in fact sustained by the
various pieces of evidence presented above, and is further supported by
the fact that his first publically expressed dissension from Darwinian
views on human nature took place at the British Association for the Advancement
of Science meetings in September 1868. This was followed several months
later by the famous Quarterly Review article of April 1869 in
which his divergent views were more dramatically made known.44

We will have a good
deal more to say on the matter of Wallace's conversion in Chapter Five,
especially as events of 1865 through 1869 contributed to his decision
to embrace spiritualism at that particular time.

*
* *

So far so good,
but appreciation of the ultimately more important matter--the philosophical
context of Wallace's conversion--has been dogged by a lack of attention
to three important matters. These are: (1) the likely mis-assumption that
his "investigation" of spiritualism consisted largely or only of "field
work," as it were, in the realm of mediated seance; (2) a general lack
of acquaintance with the moral tenets of spiritualism and the possible
grounds for accepting them; and (3) the very real possibility that Wallace's
model of natural selection had never been conceived to treat of man's
spiritual development, and that his evolutionary synthesis was still incomplete
at the time he was first fully exposed to pertinent spiritualist beliefs
and phenomena.

We cannot doubt,
on the basis of dozens of separate references from himself and others,
that Wallace's "investigation" of spiritualism in the 1860s and afterward
included his attending numerous seances. Further, there is every reason
to believe that through this experience he gained a first-hand acquaintance
with the range of supposed spiritualistic "contact phenomena" (e.g., spirit
materializations, apports, table-rappings, automatic slate-writing, etc.).
Whether these experiences were "genuine" can of course be debated, but
such discussion serves little purpose here: the question, rather, is what
Wallace believed, and how such belief led him down the path he eventually
followed. Especially to the point, why was he willing to "go public" with
his support for investigating spiritualism before he had attained a convincing
(to him, at least) level of control on his own experimentation?

Much has been made
in the literature of the history of the spiritualism movement of the gullibility
of those who attended seances. Unquestionably, a good deal of fraud was
going on, and probably Wallace's and other scientists' attempts to provide
controlled experimental settings as often as not were not up to the level
of sophistication of the deception. In Wallace's defense, however, it
should be noted that a number of the early sittings he took part in were
carried out in his own lodgings. Further, some of the people Wallace investigated
were friends of the family and/or amateurs who did not charge fees.

The whole of the debate regarding genuineness
is in the last word largely immaterial: Wallace did in fact adopt the
belief, the real question of import being why he did so, and why so many
others (the vast majority of whom were unwilling to go to such extreme
ends to examine the question) did not. Certainly it must be admitted that
in one sense or another Wallace was predisposed to accepting--absolutely--what
his eyes suggested was so. Charles Peirce once justly described him as
believing "in all he believes down to the very soles of his boots."45Peirce (whose opinion on this matter surely should be treated with
some respect) also describes him as "a great scientific reasoner...where
he differs most from received opinions his arguments are in general the
most carefully considered and consequently the strongest."46
But in the same work Peirce also states: "yet his narrow training has
rendered him an easy mark for whatsoever evil spirit there may be, personal
or not, that beguiles men into sophistries, confusions, and rash assumptions."47

It is all too easy,
however, to leap to the facile conclusion that Wallace was simply, in
Peirce's terms, "beguiled." As noted earlier, the common wisdom on this
matter has it that Wallace was experiencing profound second thoughts on
the validity of natural selection (for either, or both, scientific or
moral reasons) and was looking for a way out of the dilemma. In my opinion
this point of view represents a half-truth only. Instead, it appears to
me that Wallace's acceptance of spiritualism turned neither on his biological
studies nor on the decisiveness of his seance experiences, but ultimately
on the long-term implications of his lifelong convictions on the nature
of belief.

In defending this
assertion, I need first point out that Wallace's investigation of spiritualism
extended to more than personal observation of the feats of mediums. It
was not Wallace's habit to leap into a discussion without thoroughly preparing
himself first; in fact, judging from statements gleaned from several sources,48
he invariably began the investigation of any new subject with an exhaustive
literature review. In this instance it appears he again read everything
he could "lay his hands on" as--or possibly or probably before--he undertook
his intensive program of seance attendance.49
Consistent with this knowledge, Wallace's writings on spiritualism--including
"The Scientific Aspect of the Supernatural," written rather early on with
respect to his overall program of seance attendance--do in fact display
the same commanding knowledge of the related literature that is evident
in his treatments of other subjects.

Through this literature
review he would have learned not only of the phenomena associated with
purported contacts with spirit beings, but of the relevance of these to
the philosophical, historical and moral teachings of the movement as well.
Research on Wallace's association with spiritualism has unfortunately
usually emphasized the sensationalism attached to his seance experiences
instead of getting to the heart of what it was that attracted him to the
belief to begin with. I have already mentioned how Wallace's "The Scientific
Aspect of the Supernatural" contained argumentation designed to assure
potential investigators of the subject that they were dealing with truly
"natural" phenomena. This is by no means the only place in which he makes
this point, however. Related arguments also permeate his other two most
significant writings on spiritualism, "A Defence of Modern Spiritualism,"
and "An Answer to the Arguments of Hume, Lecky, and Others, Against Miracles."
Further examples may be found in several other of his writings. For example,
there is the following passage from the 1885 essay "Are the Phenomena
of Spiritualism in Harmony With Science?":

Now, modern Spiritualism rests
solely on the observation and comparison of facts in a domain of nature
which has been hitherto little explored, and it is a contradiction in
terms to say that such an investigation is opposed to science. Equally
absurd is the allegation that some of the phenomena of Spiritualism
"contradict the laws of nature," since there is no law of nature yet
known to us but may be apparently contravened by the action of more
recondite laws or forces. Spiritualists observe facts and record experiments,
and then construct hypotheses which will best explain and co-ordinate
the facts, and in so doing they are pursuing a truly scientific course.50

This insistence on the "naturalness" of spiritualism
forces us to confront the notion that it is not a religion--at least not
in the usual sense of that term. Thus "The spiritualist, though he does
not claim infallibility, believes he is dealing with facts; he insists that
his faith is constructed to conform to the facts, as contrasted with a change
of facts to conform to faith."51 This basis
in what might be described as "psycho-naturalism" places spiritualism squarely
within the realm of theosophy. Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary
defines "theosophy" in its more specific sense as "the beliefs of a modern
movement originating in the United States in 1875 and following chiefly
Buddhist and Brahmanic theories especially of pantheistic evolution and
reincarnation."52 Theosophy is actually not
markedly in disagreement with materialist interpretations of evolution;
in fact, it elucidates a process that both incorporates it, and extends
beyond it.53

Significantly, the
view expressed in spiritualist (and other theosophical) writings is that
the chain of natural causality extends continuously, and back and forth,
between the psychic (i.e., aspatial) and physical (i.e., spatial) domains.
The sensational manifestations of this continuity allegedly occurring
during seances and analogous conditions are, it has usually been supposed,
the only aspects of it whose causes might readily be distinguished from
the ordinary "material" phenomena of nature. Wallace and other spiritualists
argued that the evidence for at least some of the "miracles" that have
allegedly occurred throughout human history is quite satisfactory, but
that such events represent products of a natural (i.e., non-"miraculous"),
continuing interaction with "spirit beings" rather than otherwise wholly
inexplicable first causes. Miracles were thus assigned natural causes--if
one could accept that causal continuity in this instance was maintained
by yet poorly understood, but nevertheless real, forces.

Wallace's (and many
other investigators') interest in such contact phenomena was primarily
that there appeared to be no other avenue through which the subject could
be explored objectively. Most spiritualists undoubtedly adopted the belief
on faith (i.e., that observable "spirit manifestations"
indicated that the "spirit realm" actually existed) and on the strength
of its moral teachings. The more strictly personal experiences some claimed
to have had (involving, for example, Swedenborgian out-of-body travel),
even if thought to have natural causes, did not seem to lend themselves
to the methods of scientific investigation available at that time.

This is not to argue,
of course, that many believers in spiritualist doctrines are not pursuing
additional agendas. To this day there are many who through guilt or innocent
concern will do whatever they feel they must to alleviate personal pain--including,
for example, attempts to contact deceased relatives--and such needs have
often opened the gates for unscrupulous opportunists. Wallace himself
has occasionally been marginalized as turning to spiritualism in an effort
to bring closure of this sort: his younger brother Herbert had died while
in the Amazon during a probably misguided effort to turn him into a professional
natural history collector, and it has been supposed by some that Wallace's
adoption of spiritualism was related to this painful incident in his life.
I think this is a ridiculous inference. Apart from the fact that he never
reports any such contact intentions in his writings (nor any results),
the overall program of Wallace's life was not of such narrow dimension
as to have left him prone to manipulation stemming from such an event,
painful though it was to him. Wallace's agenda had to do with evolution,
and any and all forces that might contribute to it--including spirits.

Wallace's recognition
of the principle of natural selection in 1858 forced the then thirty-five
year old naturalist into the unanticipated role of celebrity. There is
nothing in the Ternate essay (or his subsequent recollections of its writing54),
however, to indicate he foresaw the degree and immediacy of natural selection's
impact on the intellectual community. The main reason for this, I suggest,
is that at that time he considered the concept only a partial solution
to a more general set of problems he had been working on for about fifteen
years. The remainder of the solution--as a continuation, not reversal,
of thought--occurred to him only as he became familiar with the writings
of spiritualism. It was almost certainly the moral, historical and philosophical
themes of the belief and their relation to the subject of natural causation
that really attracted him to the movement. In these themes he recognized
an informal characterization of natural processes which operated in a
manner transcending, yet complementing, natural selection. These views
were acceptable to Wallace because they were consistent with his Rationalist
approach to the assessment of evidence, his position on the meaning of
continuity of cause and effect, and the generally "progressive" attitude
he had maintained since adolescence.

Wallace distilled
the teachings of spiritualism in a number of his later writings. Excerpts
from several of these follow for the sake of illustration and later reference:

...The universal teaching of
modern spiritualism is that the world and the whole material universe
exist for the purpose of developing spiritual beings--that death is
simply a transition from material existence to the first grade of spirit-life--and
that our happiness and the degree of our progress will be wholly dependent
upon the use we have made of our faculties and opportunities here...55

...we are, all of us, in every
act and thought of our lives, helping to build up a mental fabric which
will be and constitute ourselves in the future life, even more completely
than now. Just in proportion as we have developed our higher intellectual
and moral nature, or starved it by disuse, shall we be well or ill fitted
for the new life we shall enter on. The Spiritualist who...knows that,
just in proportion as he indulges in passion, or selfishness, or the
reckless pursuit of wealth, and neglects to cultivate his moral and
intellectual nature, so does he inevitably prepare for himself misery
in a world in which there are no physical wants to be provided for,
no struggle to maintain mere existence, no sensual enjoyments except
those directly associated with sympathy and affection, no occupations
but those having for their object social, moral, and intellectual progress--is
impelled towards a pure and moral life by motives far stronger than
any which either philosophy or religion can supply...56

...our condition and happiness
in the future life depends, by the action of strictly natural law, on
our life and conduct here. There is no reward or punishment meted out
to us by superior beings; but, just as surely as cleanliness and exercise
and wholesome food produce health of body, so surely does a moral life
here produce health and happiness in the spirit-world...57

...all the material imperfections
of our globe, the wintry blasts and summer heats, the volcano, the whirlwind
and the flood, the barren desert and the gloomy forest, have each served
as stimuli to develop and strengthen man's intellectual nature;
while the oppression and wrong, the ignorance and crime, the misery
and pain, that always and everywhere pervade the world, have been the
means of exercising and strengthening the higher sentiments of justice,
mercy, charity, and love, which we all feel to be our best and noblest
characteristics, and which it is hardly possible to conceive could have
been developed by other means...58

...Not only is a healthy body
necessary for a sound mind, but equally so for a fully-developed soul--a
soul that is best fitted to commence its new era of development in the
spirit world. Inasmuch as we have fully utilised and developed all our
faculties--bodily, mental, and spiritual--and have done all in our power
to aid others in a similar development, so have we prepared future well-being
for ourselves and for them...59

The
preceding selections feature the following essential ideas: (1) the human
being's full span of individual existence extends onward to a period following
biological death; (2) the characteristics of conscious existence during
this alleged later period are determined primarily by the level of intellectual
and moral development attained during one's biological life experience;
(3) this intellectual and moral development is a function of the degree
of willful rejection of materialistic, self-centered goals and the adoption
of an explorative, non-pre-judging, and socially-conscious attitude; and
(4) there is, overall, a continuity of just cause and effect in nature
which cannot for long be circumvented, and which complements individual
action, sooner or later, with no more nor less than a commensurate reaction.
Theme four would have been the one that most impressed Wallace initially.
We shall return to this subject in a moment.

The relevance of these four themes to Wallace's
adoption of spiritualism can be better appreciated after examining words
he set out some twenty years before being introduced to spiritualistic
phenomena (indeed, before the beginning of "Modern Spiritualism"--in 1848--itself60).
In late 1843, while employed as a surveyor for his older brother William,
Wallace composed (and apparently delivered) a lecture entitled "The Advantages
of Varied Knowledge." Portions of the essay are reproduced and discussed
in his 1905 autobiography My Life. From this source61
the following significant passages may be noted:

[on gaining "a general acquaintance
with history, biography, art, and science":] ...There is an intrinsic
value to ourselves in these varied branches of knowledge, so much indescribable
pleasure in their possession, so much do they add to the enjoyment of
every moment of our existence, that it is impossible to estimate their
value, and we would hardly accept boundless wealth, at the cost, if
it were possible, of their irrecoverable loss. And if it is thus we
feel as to our general store of mental acquirements, still more do we
appreciate the value of any particular branch of study we may ardently
pursue... here we see the advantage possessed by him whose studies have
been in various directions, and who at different times has had many
different pursuits, for whatever may happen, he will always find something
in his surroundings to interest and instruct him...

[on gaining "a knowledge of
the elementary laws of physical science":] ...He who has extended his
inquiries into the varied phenomena of nature learns to despise no fact,
however small, and to consider the most apparently insignificant and
common occurrences as much in need of explanation as those of a grander
and more imposing character. He sees in every dewdrop trembling on
the grass causes at work analogous to those which have produced the
spherical figure of the earth and planets; and in the beautiful forms
of crystallization on his window-panes on a frosty morning he recognizes
the action of laws which may also have a part in the production of the
similar forms of planets and of many of the lower animal types.
[my italics] Thus the simplest facts of everyday life have to him an
inner meaning, and he sees that they depend upon the same general laws
as those that are at work in the grandest phenomena of nature...

...It would be a curious and interesting
thing to have a series of portraits taken of a person each successive
year. These would show the gradual changes from childhood to old age
in a very striking manner; and...might elucidate the problem of how
far the mind reacts upon the countenance. We should see the effects
of pain or pleasure, of idleness or activity, of dissipation or study,
and thus watch the action of the various passions of the mind in modifying
the form of the body, and particularly the expression of the features...
[my italics]

...Can we believe that we
are fulfilling the purpose of our existence while so many of the wonders
and beauties of the creation remain unnoticed around us? [my italics]
While so much of the mystery which man has been able to penetrate, however
imperfectly, is still all dark to us? While so many of the laws which
govern the universe and which influence our lives are, by us, unknown
and uncared for? And this not because we want the power, but the will,
to acquaint ourselves with them. Can we think it right that, with the
key to so much that we ought to know, and that we should be the better
for knowing, in our possession, we seek not to open the door, but allow
this great store of mental wealth to lie unused, producing no return
to us, while our highest powers and capacities rust for want of use?...62

...can any reflecting mind have
a doubt that, by improving to the utmost the nobler faculties of our nature
in this world, we shall be the better fitted to enter upon and enjoy whatever
new state of being the future may have in store for us?

These passages reflect
the views of the then twenty year old Wallace on the reasons for--and
advantages of--pursuing an ongoing program of many-directioned self-education
and rational, moral and intellectual exploration. Nor are these the only
such remarks expressed by Wallace at this time. In the essay "An Essay,
On the Best Method of Conducting the Kington Mechanic's Institution,"63
probably composed even earlier (about 1841) but re-discovered only in
the late twentieth century, Wallace advises that

...it is the society's duty,
both to supply the materials for diffusion of scientific and historical
information,--and by subsequent proceedings, which we shall point out,
endeavour to create or increase a taste for seeking it...64

...Periodical publications,
even the best and most scientific, cannot be expected to do more than
advert to general principles, and describe improvements and extensions
of science as they occur--but they cannot treat fully upon any one subject,
much less on the whole range of human knowledge. By these alone, therefore,
curiosity is excited, but not satisfied, which state of feeling, if
long continued, generally leads to indifference or disgust. A library
of good and valuable books will obviate this, by giving each an opportunity
of studying whatever he may consider most interesting or useful...65

...As the means of inciting
to the acquirement of knowledge on all subjects, of creating a wish
for information on what have been hitherto considered as abstruse branches
of knowledge, but which are frequently among the most interesting and
generally useful,--and of inspiring a desire for diving deeper into
its inexhaustible stores not yet exposed to the scrutinizing gaze of
man, such an institution as this, conducted in the way we have described,
will be invaluable...66

The
messages in these two early essays and the spiritualism-related excerpts
presented earlier have much in common with respect to the way they portray
the ideal "life strategy;" the only real difference, in fact, lies in
spiritualism's specific referral to an afterlife ("Advantages..." only
goes so far as to consider "whatever new state of being the future may
have in store for us"). In both sets of writings, moreover, appear the
essence of his belief in the connection between justice and natural causality,
and it is this connection that represents the cornerstone of his entire
life's work.

Wallace's scientific philosophy rests on two
basic ideas regarding the relation of cause to effect. The first is that
the occurrence of action--any action--unaccompanied by equal and commensurate
reaction is unthinkable. The doctrine of first causes therefore seemed
irrational to him: it accepted the notion of effect without relatable,
comprehendable cause. It is not clear exactly when this element of Wallace's
thinking first established itself, but his reading of Charles Lyell's
Principles of Geology in the mid 1840s possibly represented the
eventual deciding influence in the context of natural science. Lyell's
uniformitarian geological views provided Wallace with an understanding
of cause-and-effect that appealed only to continuously-acting and, importantly,
observable and verifiable, forces. It is likely, however, that the roots
of this kind of thinking in Wallace's mind extend much further back yet--perhaps
to the period of his contact with a London-based Owenite group in 1837,
as we shall discuss shortly.

Fully as central
to Wallace's cosmology as the "equal and commensurate reaction" concept,
however, were the implications stemming from his idea that "just" effect
emanated from cause. Supposing that only a limited range of "equal and
commensurate" reactions could derive from any given cause at any given
time, and accepting that the consequences of any given cause were more
or less restricted to some predominantly closed and limited domain (including
nature in general), it seemed reasonable to believe that such consequences
would eventually feed back on the agent of causation. Wallace considered
such feedback inevitable--and, as a truism, "just"--whether the reinforcement
involved was perceived as being of an immediately positive, constructive,
nature or not.

Wallace's utterly uniformitarian position on
the meaning of "just" reaction provided Wallace with a neutral starting
point for his ideas on all subjects. Consider, for example, his views
on morality. Those who could not see or understand the negative implications
of their own actions were merely amoral, and even the bad implications
themselves had the extenuating positive effect of providing instruction
for any outside party receptive enough to benefit from such consideration.67
The relative morality of behaviors could thus be assessed, with adoption
or rejection following as a function of considered appraisal. At the same
time, however--and most importantly--one should not think that new and
higher moral conceptions were constantly emanating from human beings de
novo; this contradicted his ideas on continuity of cause and effect.
Instead, such notions "come to us--we hardly know how or whence, and once
they have got possession of us we can not reject or change them at will;"68
i.e., they originate beyond the immediate domain of human consciousness,
and are merely "applied" (or better yet, "redirected") through human action.

Wallace's position
on the role of "just reaction" in progressive society was given greater
focus when he read Herbert Spencer's Social Statics in 1853.
In My Life he writes:

Soon after I returned from the
Amazon (about 1853), I read Herbert Spencer's "Social Statics," a work
for which I had a great admiration, and which seemed to me so important
in relation to political and social reform... the whole work, and more
especially the chapter on "The Right to the Use of the Earth," made
a permanent impression on me.69

Clearly, Wallace
immediately latched onto Spencer's "social justice" concept. Spencer argued
that each individual should receive no more nor less--especially no more--than
was his or her just due, a position Wallace would fully endorse to the
end of his days. There is little difficulty understanding how this fit
into the "Advantages..." argument: social evolution had to be a progressive
function of the most intelligently and morally conceived actions (i.e.,
causes). And, in fact, Wallace would later use such ideas as the foundation
for his views on land reform. As part of his annual Presidential address
to the Land Nationalisation Society in 1892 he wrote:

soon after I returned from my
travels in the Amazon Valley, I read his book on Social Statics,
and from it first derived the conception of the radical injustice of
private property in land. His irresistible logic convinced me once for
all, and I have never since had the slightest doubt upon the subject.
He taught me, that "to deprive others of their rights to the use of
the earth is to commit a crime inferior only in wickedness to the crime
of taking away their lives or their personal liberties"; and when he
added, that however difficult it might be to find a practical means
of restoring the land to the people yet "Justice sternly commands it
to be done," a seed was sown in my mind which long afterwards developed
into that principle of the separation of the inherent value of land
from the improvements effected in or upon it, which was the foundation
of the proposals in my article "How to Nationalise the Land," and this
article led to my association with Mr. Swinton, Dr. Clark, and other
friends in the formation of our Society.70

Actually,
the concept of "just reaction" is not at its core a strictly morality-based
construct. Although one might apply it logically in many directions within
the social sphere to defend the rights of individuals--and Wallace did--it
more generally reduces to a statement about uniformitarian forms of causation:
the notion that event C can always be explained on the basis of the combination
of identifiable causes A and B interacting in some particular way. It
is not surprising, therefore, to find that Wallace's adoption of the principle
led him to parallel positions within the natural sciences. One of the
most significant of these from a conceptual standpoint is how he dealt
with instinct.

Instinct represented
a particularly difficult challenge for Wallace's point of view. Instinctive
reactions come close to appearing as though they had no immediate cause--that
is to say, are in some sense first causes. Wallace's approach to the matter
is at its core a defensive one: he usually attempts to argue that particular
instincts represent learned behaviors, and may thus be discounted as instinctual.
Consider the following excerpts:

...It has been generally the
custom of writers on natural history to take the habits and instincts
of animals as the fixed point, and to consider their structure and organization
as specially adapted to be in accordance with them. But this seems quite
an arbitrary assumption, and has the bad effect of stifling inquiry
into those peculiarities which are generally classed as "instincts"
and considered as incomprehensible, but which a little consideration
of the structure of the species in question, and the peculiar
physical conditions by which it is surrounded, would show to
be the inevitable and logical result of such structure and conditions.
I am decidedly of the opinion that in very many instances we can trace
such a necessary connexion, especially among birds, and often with more
complete success than in the case which I have here attempted to explain.
For a perfect solution of the problem we must, however, have recourse
to Mr. Darwin's principle of "natural selection," and need not then
despair of arriving as a complete and true"theory of instinct..."71

...A fair consideration of all
these facts will, I think, fully support the statement with which I
commenced this article, and show that the mental faculties exhibited
by birds in the construction of their nests are the same in kind as
those manifested by mankind in the formation of their dwellings. These
are, essentially, imitation, and a slow and partial adaptation to new
conditions. To compare the work of birds with the highest manifestations
of human art and science is totally beside the question. I do not maintain
that birds are gifted with reasoning faculties at all approaching in
variety and extent to those of man. I simply hold that the phenomena
presented by their mode of building their nests, when fairly compared
with those exhibited by the great mass of mankind in building their
houses, indicate no essential difference in the kind or nature of the
mental faculties employed. If instinct means anything, it means the
capacity to perform some complex act without teaching or experience.
It implies innate ideas of a very definite kind, and, if established,
would overthrow Mr. Mill's sensationalism and all the modern philosophy
of experience. That the existence of true instinct may be established
in other ways is not improbable, but in the particular case of birds'
nests, which is usually considered one of its strongholds, I cannot
find a particle of evidence to show the existence of anything beyond
those lower reasoning powers which animals are universally admitted
to possess...72

...It appears to me that instinct
should be defined as--"the performance by an animal of complex acts,
absolutely without instruction or previously-acquired knowledge." Thus,
acts are said to be performed by birds in building their nests, by bees
in constructing their cells, and by many insects in providing for the
future wants of themselves or their progeny, without ever having seen
such acts performed by others, and without any knowledge of why they
perform them themselves. This is expressed by the very common term "blind
instinct." But we have here a number of assertions of matters of fact,
which, strange to say, have never been proved to be facts at all. They
are thought to be so self-evident that they may be taken for granted.
No one has ever yet obtained the eggs of some bird which builds an elaborate
nest, hatched these eggs by steam or under a quite distinct parent,
placed them afterwards in an extensive aviary or covered garden, where
the situation and the materials of a nest similar to that of the parent
birds may be found, and then seen what kind of nest these birds would
build. If under these rigorous conditions they choose the same materials,
the same situation, and construct the nest in the same way and as perfectly
as their parents did, instinct would be proved in their case; now it
is only assumed, and assumed, as I shall show further on, without any
sufficient reason. So, no one has ever carefully taken the pupæ
of a hive of bees out of the comb, removed them from the presence of
other bees, and loosed them in a large conservatory with plenty of flowers
and food, and observed what kind of cells they would construct. But
till this is done, no one can say that bees build without instruction,
no one can say that with every new swarm there are no bees older than
those of the same year, who may be the teachers in forming the new comb.
Now, in a scientific inquiry, a point which can be proved should not
be assumed, and a totally unknown power should not be brought in to
explain facts, when known powers may be sufficient. For both these reasons
I decline to accept the theory of instinct in any case where all other
possible modes of explanation have not been exhausted...73

...In the chapter on the "instinct
to use clothing," we have another example of our author's want of rigid
impartiality. He endeavours to show that some animals use clothing,
and that some men do not, and that it is, therefore, no distinctive
character of man. His examples of dressed animals are hermit crabs and
the larvæ of Phryganea and Tinea; and although
he adduces instances of unclothed men, he has in no way accounted for
that sense of shame which he maintains is not innate, and which yet
has, even more than the necessity for warmth, led to the practice of
clothing among so many peoples...74

...Mr. Morgan discusses at considerable
length the question of whether the effects of use and disuse are hereditary.
He admits the very imperfect character of the evidence in favour of
the proposition that they are so, and he adduces, as in his opinion
one of the best cases, "the instinctive avoidance" of nauseous and stinging
insects by most birds. As neither the nauseous taste nor the stings
are usually fatal, the avoidance of them is not of eliminating value,
and cannot, therefore, have been produced by natural selection. Hence
he thinks the inheritance of individual experience probable. But the
"instinctive avoidance" is here assumed, whereas there is now good reason
to believe that in the case of nauseous insects, and probably also of
stinging insects, the avoidance is the result of individual experience
or observation. Some of the most curious phenomena of mimicry can only
be explained on this hypothesis...75

These examples,
from a more than thirty year period (1860-1892), by no means exhaust Wallace's
various considerations of the subject of instinct. As is especially clear
from the first of the five, Wallace felt that biological adaptation was
little more than the "just" result of the interplay of ambient biological
and environmental conditions; that is, a logical outcome of conceivable
forces. The weak or maladapted individual was less successful in passing
on its traits; the broadly adapted population tended to persist at the
expense of maladapted ones. These "just results," however, were no more
than the logical implications of confining ecological realities. Biological
evolution, on the other hand, occurred as: (1) selection forces acted
on such pre-existing variation (i.e., the existing "biological domain")
and (2) variation itself was introduced as a function of biological and
extra-biological forces of whose causes and actions we were still largely
ignorant. We will have more to say on this subject in the following chapters.

*
*
*

The general point
I wish to make here is that as of 1853 (or even 1843) the only feature
distinguishing Wallace's general philosophy of life from that later endorsed
by spiritualists was the latter's assignment of their rationale for moral
behavior to a specific final cause--the "carrot" of continuing
personal evolution in the "afterlife." We need address a basic question
in this connection: Did Wallace in fact maintain fundamentally the same
philosophical perspective between 1843 and the date of his adoption of
spiritualism (about 1866)?

In view of Wallace's
subsequent activities, it can hardly be doubted that over the next two
decades he followed the advice offered in his 1841 and 1843 essays to
a tee. Certainly his experiments with mesmerism shortly thereafter attest
to his inquisitiveness, as do his later adoption of an evolutionary perspective
(as established by McKinney 1966 & 1969) and explorations and natural
history and ethnological investigations in the tropics. In the last context
his appreciations of tropical peoples are particularly refreshing: he
avoided prejudgment, especially the trap of using the state of so-called
"civilized Europe" as a basis for assessing degree of moral advance in
other cultures.76

The sentiment that
a many-directioned (and, when specifically referred to human beings, intelligently
and morally-directed) experience is fundamentally valuable to the individual
actually does consistently surface in Wallace's writings over the next
twenty years, and in a great variety of contexts. Take, for example, the
implied basis for his assessment of the relative level of civilization
attained by various native peoples:

The Dyaks are more lively, more
talkative, and less diffident than the American [Indians], and therefore
pleasanter companions. They have more amusements and are more social,
while at the same time they have less variety of weapons, and are less
skilful in their methods of obtaining game and fish. Both these circumstances
will lead us to place them one degree higher in the scale of civilization...
Dyak youths...have their social games, their trials of strength and
skill... They possess...numerous puzzles and tricks with which they
amuse themselves... These apparently trifling matters are yet of some
importance, in arriving at a true estimation of their social state.
They show that these people have passed beyond that first stage of savage
life in which the struggle for existence absorbs their whole faculties,
in which every thought and every idea is connected with war or hunting
or the provision for their immediate necessities. It shows too an advanced
capability of civilization, an aptitude to enjoy other than mere sensual
pleasures, which, properly taken advantage of, may be of great use in
an attempt to raise their social and mental condition.77

Or the following, on the "robustness" of natural
forms of selection:

In the wild animal, on the contrary
[i.e., as contrasted with domesticated forms], all its faculties and
powers being brought into full action for the necessities of existence,
any increase [of power or capacity in an organ or sense] becomes immediately
available, is strengthened by exercise, and must even slightly modify
the food, the habits, and the whole economy of the race. It creates
as it were a new animal, one of superior powers, and which will necessarily
increase in numbers and outlive those inferior to it... Domestic animals
are abnormal, artificial; they are subject to varieties which never
occur and never can occur in a state of nature: their very existence
depends altogether on human care; so far are many of them removed from
that just proportion of faculties, that true balance of organization,
by means of which alone an animal left to its own resources can preserve
and continue its race.78

The general idea that many-directioned efforts are
likely to yield the most productive long-term results is evident in the
following selections--extending across the whole of Wallace's career--as
well:

...It is only at a later period
that we observe the tree to be suffering, and in the parts most affected
we discover the Scolyti to have been at work, and erroneously impute
the mischief to them... It now becomes a question whether the supposed
criminals are not really our benefactors,--teaching us, by their presence,
that there is something wrong, before we could otherwise perceive it.
We may then be induced to inquire into the state of the soil or of the
atmosphere, and be led to examine what diseases or what enemies may
be at work on the roots or on the foliage of our trees as the points
most likely for decay and death to originate in...79

...I am convinced that no man
can be a good ethnologist who does not travel, and not travel merely,
but reside, as I do, months and years with each race, becoming well
acquainted with their average physiognomy and their character, so as
to be able to detect cross-breeds, which totally mislead the hasty traveller,
who thinks they are transitions!...80

...Your ingenious arguments
to persuade me to come home are quite unconvincing. I have much to do
before I can return with satisfaction of mind; were I to leave now I
should be ever regretful and unhappy. That alone is an all-sufficient
reason. I feel that my work is here as well as my pleasure; and why
should I not follow out my vocation? ...I am engaged in a...study...of
the relations of animals to space and time, or, in other words, their
geographical and geological distribution and its causes. I have set
myself to work out this problem in the Indo-Australian Archipelago,
and I must visit and explore the largest number of islands possible,
and collect materials from the greatest number of localities, in order
to arrive at any definite results... I could never now give my whole
mind to any work apart from the study of which I have devoted my life.81
So far from being angry at being called an enthusiast (as you seem to
suppose), it is my pride and glory to be worthy to be so called. Who
ever did anything good or great who was not an enthusiast? ...It strikes
me that the power or capability of a man in getting rich is in an inverse
proportion to his reflective powers and in direct proportion to his
impudence...82

...Nature seems to have taken
every precaution that these, her choicest treasures [birds of paradise],
may not lose value by being too easily obtained. First we find an open,
harbourless, inhospitable coast, exposed to the full swell of the Pacific
Ocean; next, a rugged and mountainous country, covered with dense forests,
offering in its swamps and precipices and serrated ridges an almost
impassable barrier to the central regions; and lastly, a race of the
most savage and ruthless character, in the very lowest stage of civilization.
In such a country and among such a people ...they display that exquisite
beauty and that marvellous development of plumage, calculated to excite
admiration and astonishment among the most civilized and most intellectual
races of man...83

...Civilisation has ever accompanied
migration and conquest--the conflict of opinion, of religion, or of
race. In proportion to the diversity of these mingling streams, have
nations progressed in literature, the arts, and in science; while, on
the other hand, when a people have been long isolated from surrounding
races, and prevented from acquiring those new ideas which contact with
them would induce, all progress has been arrested, and generation has
succeeded generation with almost the same uniformity of habits and monotony
of ideas as obtains in the animal world...84

...There are speculations which
are framed to support a foregone conclusion, and which ignore all but
the one class of facts which may be deemed favourable. Such are altogether
valueless, and deserve all the neglect that they can receive. But when
the contriver of a hypothesis has no preconceived opinions to support,
when he weighs and sets against each other all the conflicting facts
and arguments which bear upon the question, and when his sole object
is to discover what supposition will harmonise the greatest number of
facts and contradict the fewest, then his speculations deserve some
consideration, until they can be overthrown by positive evidence, or
until some other hypothesis can be framed which shall, on similar grounds,
be better worthy of acceptance...85

...The Conirostres and Dentirostres...are
professedly founded on one character only, and not on general structure;
and it is therefore not to be wondered at, that in their attempts to
pay some little regard to natural affinities, while forcing the genera
and families into these divisions, no two naturalists should be able
to arrive at the same results...86

...my object has been to show
the important bearing of researches into the natural history of every
part of the world upon the study of its past history. An accurate knowledge
of any group of birds or of insects, and of their geographical distribution,
may assist us to map out the islands and continents of a former epoch;
the amount of difference that exists between animals of adjacent districts
being closely dependent upon preceding geological changes. By the collection
of such minute facts alone can we hope to fill up a great gap in the
past history of the earth as revealed by geology...87

...It has always seemed to me
that the adoption of the minimum legal age which qualifies a person
to hold property and to occupy the simplest public offices, as sufficient
also to qualify for choosing the national representatives or for being
chosen as a legislator, is a very great political blunder. With us,
most men of twenty-one have only just finished, and many have not yet
finished, their education, whether intellectual or industrial; while
few persons at that age have given any serious thought to politics,
have made any study of the duties and rights of citizens, or have had
any real experience to guide them in forming an independent judgment
on the various political and social questions of the day. In this respect,
most savage and barbarous nations set us a good example: with them,
it is the elders who rule; and the very name of chief is often synonymous
with "old man." The most suitable age to be fixed as that of political
maturity should certainly not be below thirty, while I myself consider
forty to be preferable...88

...It rests on the principle
that, in an industrial community, those only are fit to be rulers who
have for many years formed integral parts of it, who have passed through
its various grades as workers or overseers, and who have thus acquired
an intimate practical acquaintance with its needs, its capacities, and
its possibilities of improvement. Persons who had themselves enjoyed
the advantages of the system, and who had suffered from whatever injudicious
restrictions or want of organisation had prevailed, and who had nearly
reached the age of retirement from the more laborious work, would be
free from petty jealousies of their fellow workers, and would have no
objects to aim at except the continued success of the colony and the
happiness of all its inmates. On this principle those who had worked
in the colony for at least fifteen or twenty years, and who had reached
some grade above that of simple workmen, should form the governing body,
appointing the superintendents of the various departments, and making
such general regulations as were needed to ensure the prosperity of
the community and the happiness of all its members...89

...It seems, however, to be
a very irrational conclusion that because a person is legally responsible
for his actions at this age he is also capable of forming a sound judgment
on a matter of such importance and difficulty as choosing the individuals
best fitted to form the legislature of a powerful and highly civilised
nation. To perform such a duty the voter should, in the absence of all
real knowledge of the actual laws and constitution of his country, at
least have acquired some general acquaintance with men and things, and
some experience of life in its social, municipal, and national aspects.
But with most men and women of this age, and usually between the ages
of twenty and thirty, such knowledge or experience has not been acquired.
The great majority have barely completed their intellectual or technical
education, or that manual training which gives them the power of earning
the full wage in their respective callings. Many are wholly occupied
in maintaining the struggle for life; others devote their leisure to
various forms of sport; while even those who are of a more reflective
nature, and take every opportunity afforded them for reading or for
the pursuit of some branch of science, are not thereby fitted to form
an independent judgment on the various difficult and controversial questions
which divide political parties. Nothing can give this but experience,
slowly and painfully gained through observation of, and contact with,
his fellow-men in the varied relations of life--in the capacity of buyer
and seller, of wage-earner or wage-payer, as juryman or witness, parish-councillor,
guardian, or any other capacity that brings him into active relations
with his fellows and enables him to form an opinion as to their intellectual
capacity or moral character. It may be safely stated that every five
years of added experience of this kind renders a man better fitted than
before to have a voice in choosing the legislative body, into whose
hands are committed the great issues of war or peace, of misery or well-being,
of oppression or of justice, for the whole nation. It therefore seems
to me to be one of the greatest of political errors to entrust this
important duty to the crude intelligence, the scanty experience, and
the usually prejudiced judgment of that portion of the citizens who
have only just emerged from a state of legal disability and educational
pupilage. The various considerations here set forth lead me to the conclusion
that in order to obtain the best judgment of the nation in the choice
of representatives, those only should vote who have attained the age
of forty years. This, of course, is so great a departure from what has
hitherto been the rule that it is not at all likely to be adopted, but
it seems to me that it expresses something like the ideal to be aimed
at...90

Finally, there is the following passage from a letter
of 15 March 186191 to Wallace's brother-in-law,
Thomas Sims:

...You intimate that the happiness
to be enjoyed in a future state will depend upon, and be a reward for,
our belief in certain doctrines which you believe to constitute the essence
of true religion. You must think, therefore, that belief is voluntary
and also that it is meritorious. But I think that a little consideration
will show you that belief is quite independent of our will, and our common
expressions show it. We say, "I wish I could believe him innocent, but
the evidence is too clear;" or, "Whatever people may say, I can never
believe he can do such a mean action." Now, suppose in any similar case
the evidence on both sides leads you to a certain belief or disbelief,
and then a reward is offered you for changing your opinion. Can you really
change your opinion and belief, for the hope of reward or the fear of
punishment? Will you not say, "As the matter stands I can't change my
belief. You must give me proofs that I am wrong or show that the evidence
I have heard is false, and then I may change my belief'?" It may be that
you do get more and do change your belief. But this change is not voluntary
on your part. It depends upon the force of evidence upon your individual
mind, and the evidence remaining the same and your mental faculties remaining
unimpaired--you cannot believe otherwise any more than you can fly.

Belief, then is not voluntary.
How, then, can it be meritorious? When a jury try a case, all hear the
same evidence, but nine say "Guilty" and three "Not guilty," according
to the honest belief of each. Are either of these more worthy of reward
on that account than the others? Certainly you will say No! But suppose
beforehand they all know or suspect that those who say "Not guilty"
will be punished and the rest rewarded: what is likely to be the result?
Why, perhaps six will say "Guilty" honestly believing it, and glad they
can with a clear conscience escape punishment; three will say "Not guilty"
boldly and rather bear the punishment than be false or dishonest; the
other three, fearful of being convinced against their will, will carefully
stop their ears while the witnesses for the defence are being examined,
and delude themselves with the idea they give an honest verdict because
they have heard only one side of the evidence. If any out of the dozen
deserve punishment, you surely agree with me it is these. Belief or
disbelief is therefore not meritorious, and when founded on an unfair
balance of evidence is blameable.

Now to apply the principles
in my own case. In my early youth I heard, as ninety-nine-hundredths
of the world do, only the evidence on one side, and became impressed
with a veneration for religion which has left some traces even to this
day. I have since heard and read much on both sides, and pondered much
upon the matter in all its bearings. ...I think I have fairly heard
and fairly weighed the evidence on both sides, and I remain an utter
disbeliever in almost all that you consider the most sacred truths.
I will pass over as utterly contemptible the oft-repeated accusation
that sceptics shut out evidence because they will not be governed by
the morality of Christianity. You I know will not believe that in my
case, and I know its falsehood as a general rule. I only ask, Do you
think I can change the self-formed convictions of twenty-five years,
and could you think such a change would have anything in it to merit
reward from justice? I am thankful I can see much to admire in all religions.
To the mass of mankind religion of some kind is a necessity. But whether
there be a God and whatever be His nature; whether we have an immortal
soul or not, or whatever may be our state after death, I can have no
fear of having to suffer for the study of nature and the search for
truth, or believe that those will be better off in a future state who
have lived in the belief of doctrines inculcated from childhood, and
which are to them rather a matter of blind faith than intelligent conviction.

The Sims letter is one of the most important of
all of Wallace's writings, public or private. Not only does it all but prove
that as of 1861--that is, three years after his formulation of
natural selection--Wallace was experiencing no pangs of guilt related to
his rejection of religious views, but it also succinctly roots his reasons
for such rejection in his convictions regarding the value of belief. Belief
had no intrinsic merit; only a continuing unbiased examination of the facts
pertaining to any given question resulted in values that were progress-serving.
Superficial or prejudging evaluations generated actions likely to be inconsistent
with the greater reality, and thus deserving of rejection by that reality.

"Progress" thus
occurred only as individual human beings combined a willingness to re-evaluate
positions with a receptivity to constructive change. Considering (as discussed
in the passage assigned to note 84), Wallace extended this understanding
to account for the way society in general "progressed." His approach to
classification (per note 86), moreover, suggests he had concluded that
success within the biological world was, in like fashion, a function of
a well-rounded adaptation to multiple influences. In the biological context,
of course, the analog to such "continual re-evaluation of position" was
achieved rotely, forced by ambient ecological/environmental circumstances;
nonetheless, those individual organisms (or populations) that were capable
of responding productively to the widest range of relevant constraints
were the ones that generally prevailed in the struggle for existence.92
Thus, whether one was considering the evolution of organisms or social
systems, it was possible to view progress as being facilitated by actions
deriving from a wide-ranging experience (again, whether "experience" was
achieved deliberately, through a coupling of conscious effort and receptivity,
or probabilistically, in response to complex interactions of impinging
biological forces; for example, at the population level).93

The extent to which
Wallace had at an early age digested the role of belief in effecting progress
is evidenced by his incorporation of the subject into the very first published
writing of his of which we know--the essay on the organization of mechanics'
institutions composed about 1841 (and published in 1845):

The correction of false ideas
and incorrect opinions on well-known principles of science are not among
the least benefits that would accrue from such a course as we have recommended.
How many having imbibed a false opinion, and having embraced it for
a time, as a certain and undoubted fact, are, on seeing it contradicted
without a clear explanation, more apt to doubt the truth of the principle
they have misunderstood, than willing to acknowledge that they have
been so long in error. As the means of inciting to the acquirement of
knowledge on all subjects, of creating a wish for information on what
have been hitherto considered as abstruse branches of knowledge, but
which are frequently among the most interesting and generally useful,--and
of inspiring a desire for diving deeper into its inexhaustible stores
not yet exposed to the scrutinizing gaze of man, such an institution
as this, conducted in the way we have described, will be invaluable.94

Wallace's youthful conclusions regarding the interrelationship
of justice, merit and belief are critical to understanding the directions
his thinking took in 1858 and afterward. Apparently, he had been cogitating
on such matters from a very early age; in My Life95
he notes that he first came into contact with the arguments of skeptics
in his early teens. At that time he read Thomas Paine's Age of Reason
and the works of Robert Owen and his son Robert Dale Owen, and began considering
the question of the origin of evil. An especially important influence, apparently,
was the message of a tract called Consistency, penned by Robert
Dale Owen. Wallace found the younger Owen's criticism of the doctrine of
eternal punishment fully convincing, reporting that he "thoroughly agreed
with Mr. Dale Owen's conclusion, that the orthodox religion of the day was
degrading and hideous, and that the only true and wholly beneficial religion
was that which inculcated the service of humanity, and whose only dogma
was the brotherhood of man."96

It should come as
no surprise that Wallace put the "no merit to uninformed belief" argument
to direct use on a number of later occasions. Some examples follow:

...we maintain that any temporary
influence whatever, which would induce a man to vote differently from
what he would have done by his own unbiassed judgment, is bad--that
a man has a perfect right to uphold the interests of his class, and
that it is, on the whole, better for the community that he should do
so. For, if the voter is sufficiently instructed, honest, and far-seeing,
he will be convinced that nothing that is disadvantageous to the community
as a whole can be really and permanently beneficial to his class or
party; while, if he is less advanced in social and political knowledge,
he will solve the problem the other way, and be fully satisfied that
in advancing the interests of his class he is also benefiting the community
at large. In neither case, is it at all likely, or indeed desirable,
that the temporary and personal influence of others' opinions at the
time of an election, should cause him to vote contrary to the convictions
he has deliberately arrived at, under the continued action of those
same influences, and which convictions are the full expression of his
political knowledge and honesty at the time?...97

...We next find the broad statement
that the idea of duty is not universal among men, but no evidence is
offered, except that no one act is held to be a duty universally, or
the contrary. But this is to mis-apprehend the real question, which
is rather, whether there is any race of men among whom nothing is considered
a duty. Is there any race with whom there are not certain acts which
the majority do, or refrain from doing, independently of any fear of
punishment, but because they believe them to be right or wrong? And
is there, on the other hand, any race of animals whose actions are influenced
in the same way?...98

...The belief of a future life
has been bound up with, and perhaps rested upon, the belief in the existence
and occasional appearance on earth of spiritual beings, and the spirits
of the dead, and of such popular phenomena as ghosts, visions, warnings,
premonitions, etc. Beliefs of this nature prevailed almost universally
up to about two centuries ago, when they came to a comparatively sudden
end, and have since been treated by the educated in general as fables
and superstitions, and this view has become so general and so ingrained
that many people will not allow that the question is even open to discussion
at all, even to admit the possibility of such phenomena as actual facts,
but consider it the mark of ignorance and degrading superstition. This
almost sudden revulsion of feeling (for it is a mere feeling, not belief
founded on knowledge and enquiry) may be, I think, clearly traced to
the current action of two powerful causes: one of them the witchcraft
mania of the middle ages, the other the rise of physical science...99

...They mean, as clearly as
words can convey meaning, that each one's work during the week, that
work which is the duty of our lives, and by which we maintain ourselves,
is to cease on the Sabbath; and that the law is especially to apply
to all servants of every kind, and to all beasts of burthen, which are
included under the generic term 'cattle.' This being the commandment,
how is it obeyed by those who uphold the sanctity of the law; by those
who are continually urging others to keep the Sabbath; by those who
take every opportunity of putting in force human laws against Sabbath-breakers?
Are not manservants and maidservants all at work on Sunday? Are not
servants and horses employed by the thousand to take people to church
on Sunday? Many persons, if asked why they go to church or chapel, will
say that it is to save their souls or to please God, and yet they seem
to think that they may break what they believe is God's own commandment
week after week, without any chance of displeasing Him or of losing
the souls they are so anxious to save. What makes the matter worse is
that, while they are thus disobeying the scriptural commandment in the
most flagrant manner, they are salving their consciences by abstaining,
and trying to force others to abstain, from things which are not forbidden
by the commandment, and which are not in any way opposed to its spirit...100

...Religious belief would...furnish
an adequate incentive to morality, if it were so firmly held and fully
realised as to be constantly present to the mind in all its dread reality.
But, as a matter of fact, it produces little effect of the kind, and
we must impute this, not to any shadow of doubt as to the reality of
future rewards and punishments, but rather to the undue importance attached
to belief, to prayer, to church-going, and to repentance, which are
often held to be sufficient to ensure salvation, notwithstanding repeated
lapses from morality during an otherwise religious life. The existence
of such a possible escape from the consequences of immoral acts is quite
sufficient to explain why the most sincere religious belief of the ordinary
kind is no adequate guarantee against vice or crime under the stress
of temptation...101

...I look upon the doctrine
of future rewards and punishments as a motive to action to be radically
bad, and as bad for savages as for civilized men. I look upon it, above
all, as a bad preparation for a future state. I believe that the only
way to teach and to civilize, whether children or savages, is through
the influence of love and sympathy; and the great thing to teach them
is to have the most absolute respect for the rights of others, and to
accustom them to receive pleasure from the happiness of others...I cannot
see that the teaching of all this can be furthered by the dogmas of
any religion, and I do not believe that those dogmas really have any
effect in advancing morality in one case out of a thousand...102

...I
have long since come to see that no one deserves either praise or blame
for the ideas that come to him, but only for the actions
resulting therefrom. Ideas and beliefs are certainly not voluntary acts.
They come to us--we hardly know how or whence, and
once they have got possession of us we cannot reject or change them
at will. It is for the common good that the promulgation of ideas should
be free--uninfluenced by either praise or blame, reward or punishment.
But the actions which result from our ideas may properly be
so treated, because it is only by patient thought and work, that new
ideas, if good and true, become adopted and utilised; while, if untrue
or if not adequately presented to the world, they are rejected or forgotten...103

*
*
*

By 1862 and his
return to England Wallace was a celebrity, and any concerns he may ever
have ever felt over the validity of his personal philosophy of life had
long since left him. Consider, therefore, the kind of effect spiritualist
philosophy most likely would have had on him at that point. First, it
concerned an occult subject--one, moreover, whose phenomena some were
trying to attribute to a mechanism with which he was personally familiar:
mesmerism. Each of these circumstances would have held interest for him.
Not only could he personally contribute to the discussion as mesmerism
pertained to it,104 but as a habitual champion
of unappreciated causes, he would have enjoyed trying to right what he
perceived to be naive criticisms of a poorly understood subject. Second,
the moral teachings of spiritualism were directly relatable to phenomena
that appeared to be, at least in some instances, verifiable, and were
thus believable. Here, it seemed, was another aspect of the natural world
inviting detached exploration by the intelligent skeptic, and Wallace
was by nature both skeptical and insatiably curious. Third, the teachings
themselves avoided dogma, instead encouraging the individual to respond
as his or her personal assessment of the facts warranted. No unmeritorious
belief here: this was not religion--at least not of any variety depending
on the kind of inculcation and blind acceptance to which Wallace objected.
The teachings were also perfectly in line with the ideas on continuity
of causality Wallace had reasoned out and adopted some twenty or more
years earlier. In short, he recognized in spiritualism elements of a truly
"natural" philosophy: it gave a logical, testable accounting of how just
cause and effect are related at the level of human consciousness, moral
and intellectual behavior, and evolution. Spiritualism, moreover, endorsed
his program of "balancing evidence" (as so succinctly described in the
letter of 15 March 1861 to his brother-in-law); i.e., its proponents concurred
with his earlier-expressed feeling that there was to be no fear of suffering
"for the study of nature and the search for truth." His familiarization
with spiritualism could only have fortified his already existing negative
impression of conventional theism: the less one depended on opinions served
up by unquestioning authority, the better.

On the basis of
the connections set out above alone, it is not difficult to understand
why Wallace adopted the belief. He recognized in the movement something
quite distinct from rote acceptance of unverifiable doctrines (i.e., religion),
investigated on this basis, and was convinced (rightly or wrongly) by
what he found.

Later we examine
in some detail the final page of this story: the specific events which
I feel propelled Wallace into closely studying and adopting spiritualistic
beliefs at the time he actually did.

Analysis of Wallace's intellectual development
before--or after--1858 should not rest on undefendable assumptions. It
cannot be admitted as demonstrated (and in fact the issue is hardly ever
even raised) that the teachings of spiritualism are fundamentally inconsistent
with nature as the latter is more conventionally interpreted, and, more
importantly, these teachings are, in point of fact, neither anti-evolutionary
nor anti-"progressive." In my opinion, Wallace viewed them as relaying
an evolutionary interpretation of reality, and as being, to a close approximation,
compatible with the then-developing materialistic interpretations of biological
evolution. Of course, if it is argued a priori that spiritualism
and evolution must represent mutually incompatible conceptual
domains, one inexorably arrives at the facile conclusion that upon accepting
spiritualistic beliefs Wallace must have had a change of mind regarding
natural selection's relation to man's higher faculties. But the fundamental
principles of Wallace's approach to the study of man/nature had been set
in his mind well before he finally stumbled onto natural selection, and
given the fact that he repeatedly re-affirmed his belief in those principles
in his writings over a span of seventy years--that is, over a period beginning
well before 1858--it is extremely difficult to believe that either natural
selection or spiritualism had any profound effect on re-directing them.
His relation of the two ideas is the product of his personal evolution
of thought, not its cause.

At this point we
turn to a re-examination of some of the other things that were on Wallace's
mind before 1858, and how these helped shape his formulation of natural
selection in that year.

39. Wallace might
have been attending meetings during this one year period but not contributing
any material or discussion, but this would not have been in character.
At the very least it can be confidently stated that for a year or so he
became a non-contributor. It is also very interesting
that in the six years following his return to England, Wallace both attended
and presented at each late summer annual meeting of the British Association
for the Advancement of Science--except the one held in 1865.

42. See Kottler (1974) and My Life (S729
ii, pp. 280-281) for discussion.

43. As Pels (1995), pp. 74-75, notes, Wallace's addition
of "Notes of Personal Evidence" to "The Scientific Aspect of the Supernatural"
for inclusion in On Miracles and Modern Spiritualism in 1875
was probably in part precipitated by his wish to indicate that since the
time of the August-September 1866 publication of the second, he had witnessed
spiritualistic manifestations in a private house and without the assistance
of paid mediums. As Pels indicates, this would have borne on readers'
appreciation of what constituted "reliable evidence." Thus, one can infer
that as of that time he supported spiritualism at least to the extent
of recommending its study to others, but that it was only later that he
obtained this additional proof of its legitimacy and fully adopted it.
Such proof began to emerge shortly thereafter, as in November of 1866
Wallace began attending sittings given in his own house by a Miss Nichol,
a medium discovered by his sister. Some of the phenomena reported at these
occasions were quite extraordinary, including apports; see S126
and S132, Kottler (1974), and "Notes
of Personal Evidence" for related matter. (On page 126 of "Notes
of Personal Evidence, for example, he mentions how "In the first
edition of this Essay [i.e., the 1866 version of "The Scientific
Aspect of the Supernatural"] I did not introduce any of my own observations,
because I had not then witnessed any such facts in a private house, and
without the intervention of paid mediums, as would be likely to satisfy
my readers.")

44. S142a and S146.
In late August 1868, around the time he was putting the final touches
on his book The Malay Archipelago, Wallace attended the annual
British Association for the Advancement of Science meetings at Norwich.
There he was present at the delivery of a paper by the Rev. F. O. Morris
entitled "On the Difficulties of Darwinism," and at the end of the paper
he made some comments. The latter were included in the Athenæum
issue of 19 September 1868, and included the following statement: "With
regard to the moral bearing of the question as to whether the moral and
intellectual faculties could be developed by natural selection, that was
a subject on which Mr. Darwin had not given an opinion. He (Mr. Wallace)
did not believe that Mr. Darwin's theory would entirely explain those
mental phenomena." The existence of these remarks was first reported in
C. Smith (2004). Some seven months later, in April 1869, the more celebrated
Quarterly Review article was published which led to Darwin's
"I hope you haven't murdered our own child" remark.

53. It is well known that the leader of the theosophy
movement, Madame Helena Blavatsky, was interested in getting Wallace's
support for it. Blavatsky sent Wallace a copy of her most important book,
Isis Unveiled, after it was published in 1877 (S624).
Wallace was appreciative and complimented her on her efforts, but never
showed any interest in theosophical doctrines. In 1904 he wrote a short
essay (S618a) on the subject of reincarnation
(one of theosophy's central ideas) in which he referred to it as a "grotesque
nightmare."

58. S379, p. 810. Wallace took
a lifelong interest in the question "Why does suffering exist?" He discusses
his early fascination with the problem in S729
i, pp. 87-89. See S324 and S729
ii, pp. 237-238, for two of his typical treatments of the matter; as late
as 1910 he was still commenting on related matters: see "Is Nature Cruel?,"
Chapter 19 of The World of Life (S732).
Wallace considered it one of spiritualism's strongest philosophical points
that it offered a logical answer to this question.

59. S545, p. 335. In addition
to the works just quoted, see S398, S717,
and S750 for other typical writings. Wallace published
some one hundred essays, lectures, reviews, notes, and letters to the
Editor on spiritualistic subjects.

60. The epoch
of "Modern Spiritualism" began in 1848 when the young sisters Kate and
Margaret Fox, of Hydeville, New York, reputedly entered into communication
with an entity or force that was causing an intermittent commotion of
loud raps and knocks in their house. Mediumistic involvement followed,
during which a message proclaiming the dawn of a new era was "received."
Various organizations quickly sprang up to study both the manifestations
being reported, and their philosophical context.

62. Wallace closed his paper "On the Physical Geography
of the Malay Archipelago" (S78), read to the Royal
Geographical Society on 8 June 1863, with the following remarks: "If...[the
European powers do not undertake comprehensive natural history collecting
programs in the areas they are colonizing] ...future ages will certainly
look back upon us as a people so immersed in the pursuit of wealth as
to be blind to higher considerations. They will charge us with having
culpably allowed the destruction of some of these records of Creation
which we had it in our power to preserve; and while professing to regard
every living thing as the direct handiwork and best evidence of a Creator,
yet, with a strange inconsistency, seeing many of them perish irrecoverably
from the face of the earth, uncared for and unknown." These sentiments
are very close to those expressed in this section of "Advantages...".
McKinney (1976) interprets this passage as possibly signifying a pre-1864
religious conversion on Wallace's part, but I feel it is probably better
to regard it as a straightforward re-statement of a philosophical position
he had adopted much earlier.

63. In
Richard Parry, ed., The History of Kington (Kington, 1845), pp.
66-70. See Hughes (1989) for discussion.

64. ibid.,
p. 67.

65. ibid.,
p. 67.

66. ibid.,
p. 69.

67. Wallace was
not generally inclined toward pure moralizing; he probably felt that such
inculcation had little effect on producing "informed belief." Still, on
at least one occasion he deliberately does so, most probably in an attempt
to teach by example. In Volume One of My Life, he spends the better
part of a chapter describing the life and exploits of one Jack Mytton,
a notorious miscreant of the early nineteenth century who had been born
wealthy but had philandered away a fortune and died in prison.

76. Wallace has
been cited in many sources for his period-atypical enlightened view of
uncivilized peoples. In view of the deplorably misleading remarks of Pannell
(1992), however, a few representative reminders of this generosity of
viewpoint are worth reproducing:

The more I see of uncivilised
people, the better I think of human nature on the whole, and the essential
differences between so-called civilised and savage man seem to disappear.
[from an 1855 letter reproduced in Marchant (1916; 1975 reprint ed.),
p. 45]

I have lived a month with the
Dyaks and have been a journey about sixty miles into the interior. I have
been very much pleased with the Dyaks. They are a very kind, simple and
hospitable people, and I do not wonder at the great interest Sir J. Brooke
takes in them. [from an 1855 letter reproduced in Marchant (1916; 1975
reprint ed.), p. 48]

...after dusk, the house was crowded with young men and boys... They
were mostly fine young fellows, and I could not help admiring the simplicity
and elegance of their costume... The costume of the Dyaks on ordinary
occasions, though scanty, is highly becoming, but when they attempt
to make themselves extremely fine on state occasions, they only succeed
in becoming ridiculous. In civilized countries it is the same...
[Wallace's italics] The moral character of the Dyaks is undoubtedly
high. They are truthful and honest to a remarkable degree...above most
uncivilized, and perhaps also above most civilized, nations. (S29,
pp. 195, 197, 204-205)

[in reference to the natives of
the Aru Islands] Here, as among the Dyaks of Borneo and the Indians of
the Upper Amazon I am delighted with the beauty of the human form, a beauty
of which stay at home civilized people can never have any conception.
What are the finest grecian statues to the living moving breathing forms
which everywhere surround me... [from Wallace's Field Journal, quoted
in Brooks (1984), p. 170]

It is clear, therefore, that a low state of material civilisation is
no indication whatever of inferiority of character... we find that the
supposed great mental inferiority of savages is equally unfounded. The
more they are sympathetically studied, the more they are found to resemble
ourselves in their inherent intellectual powers. Even the so-long-despised
Australians--almost the lowest in material progress--yet show by their
complex language, their elaborate social regulations, and often by an
innate nobility of character, indications of a very similar inner nature
to our own... we find in the higher Pacific types, men who, though savages
as regards material progress, are yet generally admitted to be--physically,
intellectually, and morally--our equals, if not our superiors. (S649,
pp. 18, 21)

Chapter Six of Social Environment
and Moral Progress, one of Wallace's very last works, is entitled "Savages
Not Morally Inferior to Civilized Races." At one point in this discussion
he states "Many other illustrations of both intelligence and morality are
met with among the savage races of the world; and these, taken as a whole,
show a substantial identity of human character, both moral and emotional,
with no marked superiority in any race or country" (S733,
p. 43). It would appear therefore that he had not changed his mind on this
matter even by this late date.

83. S67, p. 160. These words
practically glow with the idea that the best efforts tend to produce the
most rewarding discoveries. The same concepts are also evident in the
following excerpt from the 1870 letter to Nature entitled "Government
Aid to Science" (S158, p. 315):

The only logical foundation for
advocating the furtherance of scientific discovery by the expenditure
of public money, would be the belief that science can be most successfully
pursued by those whose chief object is to make practical and valuable
discoveries; whereas the whole history of the progress of science seems
to me to show that the exact opposite is the case, and that it is only
those who in a noble spirit of self-sacrifice give up their time, their
means, even their lives, in the eager and loving search after the hidden
secrets of Nature, who are rewarded by those great discoveries from
which spring a rich harvest of useful applications.

84. S82, p. 206. This paper,
"On the Varieties of Man in the Malay Archipelago," was first presented
publicly in September 1863 at the annual meeting of the British Association
for the Advancement of Science. In it Wallace expands on his views regarding
how individual persons "progress" (i.e., as the function of a many-directioned
learning process) to a parallel prescription for success at the societal
level. This theme is present, explicitly and/or implicitly, in many other
of his writings, and throughout his career, e.g.: S65
(1862), S152 (1869), S257
(1876), and S445 (1892). One suspects that his
conclusions on this score were among his earliest intellectual achievements,
emerging at the same time as his thoughts on the "advantages of varied
knowledge." From his essay on "The South-Wales Farmer," written in 1843
but remaining unpublished until appearing on pp. 206-222 of Vol. 1 of
My Life (S729), the following passage
might be noted in this regard:

[The South-Wales farmers'] system
of farming is as poor as the land they cultivate. In it we see all the
results of carelessness, prejudice, and complete ignorance. We see the
principle of doing as well as those who went before them, and no better,
in full operation; the good old system which teaches us not to suppose
ourselves capable of improving on the wisdom of our forefathers, and which
has made the early polished nations of the East so inferior in every respect
to us, whose reclamation from barbarism is ephemeral compared with their
long period of almost stationary civilization. The Welshman, when you
recommend any improvement in his operations, will tell you, like the Chinaman,
that it is an "old custom," and that what did for his forefathers is good
enough for him. (p. 207)

86. Wallace favored basing classification on multiple
character traits. In fact, as we shall see later, he was not averse to
applying even behavioral characters to classification efforts in an effort
to draw into consideration as many pertinent criteria as possible. For
two other discussions featuring his support of multiple character-based
classification, see S77 and S88.

92. Such "roteness
of re-evaluation" implies that there is a degree of environmental control
over the nature of organic change, but this understanding does not demand
outright determinism. See C. Smith (1986) for related discussion.

93. In My Life (S729
ii, p. 272) Wallace writes: "Equality of opportunity is, as Herbert Spencer
has shown in his Justice, the correlative of natural selection
in human society, and thus has a broad foundation in the laws of nature."

104. As he did, for example, in a review (S207)
of Edward Tylor's Primitive Culture, letters to Nature
(S208) and The Daily News, London (S263
and S264), and a review (S270)
of William B. Carpenter's Mesmerism, Spiritualism, etc., Historically
and Scientifically Considered.

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